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Oct 15 (Reuters) – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Friday said it would investigate the Texas air regulator over allegations of racial bias in rulings involving pollution in Black neighborhoods by a refinery waste recycler.

* “Ships with a scrubber are capable of running an almost profitable freight rate, but since the Baltic considers only ships without a scrubber, high fuel costs are really bringing down index readings and time charter equivalent earnings,” said Peter Sand, chief shipping analyst at BIMCO.

Shivakumar, chief financial officer with the Great Eastern Shipping Company, said it would go ahead with a number of scrubber installations despite the change in the fuel differential, which he described as “disappointing”. (Additional reporting by Roslan Khasawneh in Singapore; Editing by Veronica Brown and Pravin Char)

For this, the mum from Perth relies on the Sabco Grout Brush ($4.50) from Bunnings, the Rubbermaid Power Scrubber ($20) from Bunnings and the $5 Glitz Cream Cleanser, also from the discount hardware store.

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Jan 30 (Reuters) – The capesize component of the Baltic sea freight index plunged to an all-time low on Thursday, hurt by high fuel costs owed to new shipping regulations and a seasonal slowdown worsened by a coronavirus outbreak.

In the run-up to IMO 2020, dozens of traders and ship owners, bet on installing scrubbers hoping to make a profit from buying cheaper high-sulphur fuel as the newly developed 0.5% alternative would be in tight supply.

Clarksons Research said it recorded a significant slowing in the number of ships already in service installing scrubbers, estimating there were under 100 vessels undergoing retrofits versus over 300 at the start of the year.

Regulations from United Nations agency the International Maritime Organization (IMO), which took effect in January, were viewed by the oil and shipping industries as one of the first worldwide efforts to enforce environmental change.

LONDON, June 12 (Reuters) – Ship owners are postponing or cancelling the installation of “scrubbers” that extract harmful sulphur emissions from their vessels as the coronavirus pandemic tightens finances.

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* Foreign evacuees from the Chinese city of Wuhan entered quarantine on Thursday, as deaths from a fast-spreading virus rose to 170 and markets weighed the impact of an inevitable big hit to the world’s No.

But with an average cost of $2 million to install just one, the stakes were already high for fleet operators often facing investments of more than $100 million. Now the industry financial squeeze, caused by a decline in demand for freight services due to the COVID-19 crisis, may mean scrubbers become less of an option for ship owners to comply with regulations.

“With the narrow price differential, it doubles the length of time for scrubber payback. Seaways installed scrubbers on our highest-consuming ships and the payback period is likely within 2-3 years,” she told Reuters.

The global oil price crash has also prompted a slide in the differential between lower (LSFO) and higher-sulphur fuel (HSFO) to as low as $40 a tonne, from over $300 at the start of the year, eating into profitability for companies who paid for scrubbers and lengthening the time for a return on their investment.

Companies that have bought scrubbers say, however, that a rebound in oil prices – and a narrower difference in costs between high and low sulphur fuel – will once again make the devices more cost-effective.

Leading Norwegian firm Wallenius Wilhemsen, which transports cars and other vehicles, told Reuters it had cancelled scrubbers for nine ships in the past few months and postponed an additional eight until later this year or 2021.

Operators had the alternative option to install devices – scrubbers – to strip out the pollutant, which causes lung problems among humans and contributes to acidification of oceans and acid rain, but has not been directly linked to climate change like carbon.